The Broken Soul Pavilion had its own rhythm, a slow, agonizing pulse of dripping water and the rhythmic bubbling of cauldrons. For Hua Sui, this rhythm was a constant reminder of his countdown to death. In the eyes of Old Man Qin, he was no longer a person, but a "high-quality vessel" that was finally reaching its peak maturity.
A month had passed since Hua Sui had first begun refining the poisons within his body. His Rank 4 Qi Condensation was now stable, hidden beneath a layer of deceptive weakness. To any observer, he was still the same hunched, sickly youth, his skin sallow and his breath ragged. But beneath that fragile shell, his Inverse Meridians had become like obsidian conduits, humming with a dark, volatile power that craved release.
Old Man Qin's behavior had become increasingly erratic. The old cultivator was running out of time. His lifeforce was a flickering candle in a gale, and his obsession with the Blood Foundation Pill had reached a fever pitch. He had begun to sleep in the refining room, his matted white hair falling over his sunken eyes as he muttered incantations that sounded like the scratching of insects.
"Tonight..." Qin wheezed, his voice cracking like dry parchment. "Tonight, the stars align with the Yin-Gorge. The 'Great Inverse Reversal' begins."
Hua Sui, who was scrubbing the soot from a secondary furnace, felt a jolt of cold lightning go through his heart. The Great Inverse Reversal. He knew what that meant from the fragmented notes he had stolen from Qin's study. It was the ritual of possession. Qin intended to dissolve his own aging body and force his soul into Hua Sui's, using the Inverse Meridians to anchor his spirit.
It was a death sentence for Hua Sui. His soul would be crushed, his consciousness erased, and his body turned into a puppet for a madman.
"Come here, boy," Qin commanded, beckoning with a withered, claw-like hand.
Hua Sui stood up slowly, wiping his hands on his grease-stained apron. He kept his head low, his posture submissive. "Yes, Master."
"You have been a faithful tool," Qin said, a grotesque, toothless grin stretching across his face. "Soon, you shall be more. You shall be the foundation of my new life. We shall achieve immortality together."
He led Hua Sui to the center of the pavilion, where a massive, circular array had been drawn in dark, dried blood. In the center sat the black cauldron, radiating a heavy, oppressive heat. The air was so thick with the scent of sulfur and bitter almonds that it felt like breathing lead.
"Strip," Qin barked.
Hua Sui obeyed, removing his tattered robes until he stood shivering in the damp chill of the hall. His body was a map of tragedy—scars from chemical burns, bruises from beatings, and the eerie, pulsating grey veins that marked his Inverse constitution.
"Sit in the center of the array," Qin instructed, his hands trembling with excitement. "Do not move. Do not speak. If you disrupt the flow of Qi, the backlash will turn your soul into a thousand years of agony."
Hua Sui sat. He closed his eyes, not out of fear, but to focus every ounce of his will. He could feel the array beneath him beginning to glow with a faint, sickly green light. Old Man Qin began to chant, his voice rising in volume and pitch, the syllables sounding like the screams of dying animals.
As the ritual progressed, Hua Sui felt a foreign, invasive force clawing at the edges of his consciousness. It was Qin's spiritual sense—cold, oily, and ancient. It sought the entrance to his dantian, looking to seize the Grey Seed.
He thinks I am an empty vessel, Hua Sui thought, a cold, sharp killing intent blooming in his mind. He thinks I have been a passive victim for all these years.
Suddenly, the green light of the array turned blood-red. The air in the pavilion screamed as the spiritual energy was forcibly inverted. Old Man Qin's physical body began to wither at an impossible rate, his flesh sinking into his bones as he poured his entire essence into the soul-projection.
"Now! Yield your body to me!" Qin's soul roared, a ghostly, translucent version of the old man erupting from his decaying corpse and lunging toward Hua Sui's forehead.
In that split second, Hua Sui opened his eyes. They weren't the eyes of a frightened slave; they were the eyes of a wolf that had been waiting in the tall grass for five years.
"Yield?" Hua Sui whispered, a terrifying smirk twisting his lips. "Master, you taught me that the Inverse Path knows no master. It only knows hunger."
Instead of resisting the possession, Hua Sui did the unthinkable. He opened his meridians wide, creating a massive, sucking vacuum.
Inverse Qi: Great Devouring!
The grey vortex in his dantian exploded into motion. The incoming soul of Old Man Qin, which had expected a weak, unformed spirit, was suddenly caught in a whirlpool of absolute destruction.
"What?! You have cultivation?! Rank 4?!" Qin's ghostly face contorted in pure, unadulterated terror. "Impossible! Your meridians should have been shattered by the poisons! How—"
"I didn't survive the poisons, Master," Hua Sui's voice echoed through the hall, overlapping with the roar of the array. "I became them."
The grey energy lashed out like tentacles, wrapping around Qin's soul and dragging it inch by inch into the Grey Seed. It was a reversal of roles so absolute that the very air seemed to crack. The predator was being consumed by the prey.
"Stop! Please! I will give you everything! My treasures, my techniques!" Qin's soul shrieked, his form blurring as it was shredded by the Inverse Qi.
Hua Sui didn't answer. He felt a surge of raw, unrefined memories and spiritual power flooding into his mind. The old man's decades of cultivation were being ground into dust and absorbed. The pain was excruciating—it felt like his brain was being scraped with a rusted knife—but Hua Sui welcomed it. Every ounce of pain was an ounce of power he had stolen back from his tormentor.
With a final, silent explosion of grey light, the soul of Old Man Qin was extinguished.
The pavilion fell silent. The green and red lights faded, leaving only the dim glow of the dying embers in the furnace. Hua Sui sat in the center of the blood-stained array, his body trembling, his breath coming in jagged gasps.
He looked down at his hands. They were covered in a fine layer of grey ash—all that remained of the man who had held his life in his hands for five years.
He was alone. He was a murderer. He was a practitioner of a forbidden path.
But for the first time in his life, Hua Sui was free.
He stood up, his movements fluid and strong. He walked over to the black cauldron, looking at the half-finished Blood Foundation Pill within. He had the knowledge now. He had the power. All he needed was the final ingredient.
"The hunt has truly begun," he said, his voice cold and steady.